Latisha showed up for Transforming Your Presentation Skills in quite a state. She was very self-conscious. No matter what I said, she kept asking me to coach her on her hand gestures and her words.
“Do you think this hand gesture is better than this one? Do I have more presence if I put my hand on my hip like this?”
On and on. It took Latisha all morning to realize I wasn’t going to coach her on any of that.
It’s a common mistake - I’m always coaching people on this point.
Do you have a favorite photo of you?
If you’re like most people, you have many photos of you that you’re not crazy about, and a small handful you like. That photo you do like captures for forever something wonderful about you. It’s the one photo of you that makes even you smile.
A really good photographer knows how to bring that out in you. That’s what I do in teaching people virtual presentation skills. Bring it out. In this article I want to help you see WHY you like that photo of you and not others.
This will help you create more photos you like, but the reason I’m focusing on this is that the same principle applies to creating powerful communication virtually, especially when you’re giving virtual presentations.
I’m going to use Marc as an example. Marc is a senior executive I coached this week, helping him prepare for a presentation he’ll be making with thousands watching. The two reasons people are listening to Marc are interest in his content and his position in the organization.
As a technical leader, Marc is extremely knowledgeable and has great technical content. Marc also has a great strategy, and he’s innovative. None of these come across.
It comes across dry. Fine for the first 3 minutes, then disappointingly uninspiring. He can’t wait for it to be over, and neither can you.
How do you bring out the charisma of someone like this?
Let me bridge back to you and talk about how do you bring it out of yourself?
Well first let me tell you how NOT to do it.
You know when someone’s taking your picture and they tell you to smile? What are you feeling at that moment? Pretty awful, right? Like you’re forcing yourself to smile when you’re not feeling it. You’re FORCING that smile. You hold it until the camera clicks. And then you drop it.
When you do that, your smile looks fake. It doesn’t match the look in your eyes.
The look in your eyes is THE most powerful, THE most important, aspect of your body language there is.
People ask me all the time if body language is important. My answer is an unqualified YES! But we have to look at WHERE it comes from.
If you work on the superficial, your body language will be terrible because it’s fake, like you see in the bad photo which captures your fake body language and freezes it in time for you.
Let me repeat this. The look in your eyes is THE most powerful, THE most important, aspect of your body.
Whether you are in person and even MORE so when you’re virtual!
When your smile doesn’t MATCH your eyes, whether in a photo, an in-person conversation or a presentation, you DON’T look good. I don’t even need to see you to tell you I’m 100% certain of that.
The other thing that happens when someone tells you to smile for the camera, is that you get self-conscious.
Self-conscious literally means too conscious or aware of yourself. It means you’re putting your attention on yourself.
Having attention on yourself VIOLATES every principle of powerful and effective communication.
Imagine watching your arm while you play tennis. How well will you play?
If you look back at that photo of yourself that you really like, what was your attention on?
What were you thinking?
Most importantly, what were you feeling?
I have no doubt you had no attention on yourself and you were filled with a powerful feeling. Right?
And it showed in your EYES.
An empty smile will NEVER create the effect we’re looking for.
It’s not in your mouth. It’s in your eyes.
You want your eyes to speak.
Film stars in silent movies knew this very well. They didn’t have sound to carry them. They spoke with their eyes.
How you do that is by what you’re thinking and what you’re feeling.
Let me make a point here. Your eyes speak whether you want them to or not. If you’re feeling any anxiety, if you’re even a little bit self-conscious, believe me your eyes are speaking that out to the world.
I have a photo of me I really like. I’m in India with 225 students. They’re each doing individual exercises. I’m wearing a beautiful Indian salwar (gorgeous silk tunic over fabulously elegant pants). I’m holding a clipboard loosely in my right arm and my left hand is on my hip. I’m closely observing a young student as he works on his assignment. I’m utterly absorbed in him and the look of pure love on my face floods the photo. This photo captures timeless beauty.
Genuine and great affinity for the person or persons you’re talking to is what puts that beautiful look in your eyes and makes you look good, makes you beautiful or handsome. And, very importantly, makes others respond.
I coach many senior executives. Only a small percent of them have sufficient affinity to be called charismatic.
I’m like the photographer who can draw the charisma out. I draw their affinity out.
I do this by coaching them on what’s in their core. Not superficial facial expressions or hand gestures, but their core, which is the true fountain, the true source, of charisma.
Going back to Marc, he looks like two different people in his “before” and “after” videos.
In his “before” video, Marc’s eyes are dead. They’re not cold, just lifeless. He smiles occasionally, but his eyes have no life.
In his “after” video, Marc’s eyes are filled with great warmth, they’re smiling, twinkling even. The look in his eyes fills you with great warmth for him.
This can ONLY happen with genuine feelings of affinity. You will never be successful faking it or forcing it. It has to be REALLY happening inside you.
It comes from inside you, moves to your eyes and then to your smile.
Marrying Marc’s incredible content with charisma created a leader whose communication is inspiring. I guarantee if you see him talk, you’ll find yourself smiling without even realizing you’re doing it, a smile that starts before you even have time to think about it. It starts the moment he starts speaking.
Which brings me to another point.
Many people have momentary bursts of affinity in their presentations. A small burst at the beginning, one or max two brief bursts in the middle and occasionally a tiny burst when they’re leaving. They’re all momentary and over in a flash.
Very few maintain powerful affinity throughout their entire talk. You can see it in their eyes. No life in the eyes throughout most of their presentation.
The key is to start STRONG and CONTINUE that affinity throughout your entire presentation. Of course that feeling will still have very natural peaks and valleys, but in a much HIGHER range of feeling that brings out the BEST in you.
My inbox is full of emails from students I coached last week, telling me that already this week they’re getting incredible results and the feedback they’re receiving is that they’re now “Amazing!”
Nothing makes me happier than helping someone who wants to reach others with their ideas achieve their goal. Nothing makes me happier than filling the world with great communicators. Nothing makes me happier than helping people be amazing. If we do this enough, we’ll have an amazing world.
Be the cause!
Last week I delivered a workshop to 42 extremely bright design engineers.
I asked for a volunteer and a real life situation so the group could see exactly the change I was teaching. I like to demonstrate everything and everyone loves these demonstrations.
The volunteer came up with a difficult scenario relevant to the group. She was trying to persuade me to try a new design that threatened the status quo and my firmly held beliefs. I was stubbornly yet realistically (exactly the way it happens in real life) not going for it.
She talked and talked. It was tense, uncomfortable, she was unsuccessful.
I coached her and had her do it again. Suddenly she got through to me. With just one sentence. It wasn’t what she said, it wasn’t the words.
It was how she said it.
The senior executive of the group burst out with, “Her whole body language changed!”
It was true. Everything about her body language had changed. Her eyes, the way she looked at me as she was leaning toward me, her hand gestures, her shoulder position, the expression on her face, her whole face, her whole body, everything.
She had real power.
It reminded me of all the times I’ve been asked in my workshops questions about body language, its importance, how to make it effective.
If you start focusing on your hands, whether your eyes arms are crossed, your facial expression, leaning in, your hand gestures, what your feet are doing, any of this, you’ve got way too much attention on all the wrong things.
Body language comes from within.
When everything INSIDE you falls into place, your body language will be perfect.
When you achieve a calm stillness, a presence, complete certainty, total confidence, a feeling of real warmth for the other person, inner strength, positive intention, unhurried poise, pure understanding ... believe me, at that moment, your face is radiant and your body language is powerful.
That's what I coached her on.
It wasn’t that her body language was suddenly effective and therefore so was she. It was the other way around. What was inside her suddenly became powerfully effective and her body language was a reflection of that.
The place to focus is within. That’s where the source of being causative is located. In your heart, in your mind, in that place where you are really you, the best version of you.
Bring that out and get that right, believe me, you will be causative.
And your body language will reflect your power.
Be the cause!
Ingrid
Body language is created by how you feel, your emotions. If you try to control your body language, or voice tone by themselves, and if they don’t match how you really feel, you’ll look forced, you won't come across as authentic.
What is in your eyes is THE most important “body language” you have. Your eyes communicate your innermost feelings. It's all about the way you look at the other person or, if you're talking to a group, how you look at your audience.
You can think about how the way another person looks at you makes you feel, how important it is, not just THAT they look at you, but HOW they look at you.
If you're not feeling confidence, you're not going to look at anyone with confidence. If you try to fake it, it will look like you're straining. If you're really afraid, you'll have a hard time looking at anyone at all.
The rest of your body language is incidental to what is in your eyes.
Many people have said they've been told that when their arms are crossed, they look “defensive”. But I've seen plenty of people with their arms crossed, who have a warm look in their eyes, their eyes telling me they're clearly interested, open and paying attention, they don't look defensive at all. The arms are incidental.
In short, the eyes have it. As one of our ETS coaches says,
It’s amazing how much the eyes communicate when they are actually meant for seeing.
One of the biggest things that’s going to influence what’s in your eyes is whether your attention is on yourself, or what you’re going to say, or whether your attention is FULLY on the other person.
Self-consciousness literally means too much attention on self.
Too much attention on yourself, on what you’re saying or on the outcome you want, messes with your eyes.
I just delivered a workshop on presentation skills where a big issue for participants was learning the art of NOT thinking and talking at the same time, not planning what to say next, but gaining the ability to put all their attention on their audience and deliver the full impact of their communication directly.
Many people think you have to know your material, and what you're going to say, extremely well before you're able to do this, but it's not true. It's a matter of practice, and even people who know their material very well need to practice keeping their attention on the audience.
Having a strong intention to communicate drives out self-consciousness and this can be seen in your eyes.
The affinity you genuinely feel (or don’t feel) for the other person or persons also shows in your eyes.
When you have your attention fully off yourself, and you have a strong intention to communicate, and you have genuine affinity for your audience, your eyes will captivate and the rest of your body language will fall into place. This is true whether you’re talking 1-to-1 or 1-to-many.
In the workshop I just finished last week, there was a gentleman who learned to take his attention off of planning what to say next and put it squarely on the audience. As he did so, his hand gestures became powerful and brilliant. I never coached him on his hand gestures and he didn’t even notice them until I pointed out how great they had become. I coached him on what was going on inside him, and when this was all straight, his hands knew exactly what to do. As he spoke with strong intention and great affinity for the audience, they said he came across as a Commander.
A very powerful woman was in the workshop. Powerful until she got up to speak. She was constantly focused on what to say next and her eyes were flitting around. However, when she learned how to put her focus on the audience, her eyes really connected with the individuals, her full power came out in a blaze of glory. She now touches your mind and also your heart.
I also had a very polished speaker in the workshop, one who has won many awards for a variety of communications. His presentation was very interesting and in the beginning he was more interested in it than he was in the audience. As he shifted his focus from what he was saying to the people he was talking to, he went from “interesting” to absolutely riveting.
One participant was very nervous and really couldn't look at the audience at all. When she tuned into the audience, and really experienced them, her eyes lit up with enjoyment. The audience called her delightful.
Authentic goes both ways.
For sure you want to be authentic with the other person, but the first person you want to be authentic with is you.
That is why you want to tap into that source of confidence within you, your intention, and your natural affinity for people. Tap into it and FEEL it. Then you are authentic to yourself and you will be authentic to the rest of the world too.
Your eyes will captivate.
If you need any extra help with this, feel free to email me with any questions you have. I’m more than happy to help you captivate your audiences.
Causative [kaw’-zuh-tiv], adjective: Making what you want HAPPEN. Being able to cause your intended effect or outcome at will.
If you're serious about your goals, our workshops and coaching will give you the tools and skills to achieve them.
We know they work because we’re swimming in client success stories. They got the promotion, conflict evaporated, the other person changed completely, their vision is spreading throughout the organization, they closed the $400 million deal, they are enthralling audiences, receiving standing ovations and their teenager’s talking to them.
Most people live their entire lives with this power lying dormant inside of them. You don’t have to be one of them.
The power to transform any situation or any person begins with your ability to assume the cause role in your communications.
Be the cause!
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